Month of July, 2010

An American-owned apparel factory in the Dominican Republic has committed to pay a living wage — three times the average for the industry there.

The global energy sector is at a crossroads. Key issues such as a lack of energy independence, the security of energy supplies, and climate change have become important items on the agendas of governments everywhere. This has sparked a heated debate about the most appropriate energy mix. These issues were discussed during a panel session on the future of energy at the recent Wharton Global Alumni Forum in Madrid.

Produced by BCG in collaboration with MIT Sloan Management Review, this report presents findings from a global survey of more than 1,500 corporate leaders and in-depth interviews with more than 50 thought leaders on how sustainability is affecting business.

Eric Cornuel, on how companies (and organisations in the broadest sense of the term) must be much more integrated into professors’ teaching and research concerns and not only as fields of investigation. This is a pre-requisite if we ever hope to see companies become important actors in institutional funding and governance.

This study examines the importance of external monitoring and public reporting on the performance of firms in the global apparel industry. By focusing on the relevance of company reputation in the global community, the authors examine financial performance and stock market reaction to the release of information describing the manufacturing practices of firms made available by a third-party monitor.

Regular commentary, links and thoughts on global corporate responsibility. Penned by Toby Webb, founder and MD of Ethical Corporation

The first book to provide comparable national profiles that describe the evolution and practice of CSR for 58 countries and 5 global regions.

This book reviews the first ten years of the Compact's existence (2000–2010) by presenting exclusively commissioned chapters from well-known scholars, practitioners from the business world and civil society, and Global Compact staff. They reflect on what the Global Compact has achieved, what trends it may have to respond to, and what challenges are ahead.

The Indian Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA) came into the limelight because of the corporate fraud scandal involving one of the companies that made headlines in early 2009.

Up to now only a few empirical evaluations of the contribution of the GC to CSR strategies have been conducted that however have not differentiated between different types of companies (regarding type of industry or regarding the maturity of CSR). This paper aims to partly fill this knowledge gap by a case study examination of three frontrunner companies in the telecommunications industry.

This publication aims to raise awareness on sustainable development strategies and marketing in business. It targets managers working in the following functions: marketing, communication, branding and product development.

The disaster in the Gulf of Mexico is straining ties between companies and activists

This paper examines seven global ethics codes to determine their coverage of human rights and concludes that if these initiatives succeed, particularly the more recent codes, transnational corporations may emerge as a major force in promoting human rights globally.

This new report frames the key issue areas that need to be addressed to move the field of inclusive business forward – toward greater scale and effectiveness

The Partnering Toolbook by Ros Tennyson offers a concise overview of the essential elements that make for effective partnering

CSR Europe's Toolbox includes information, ideas and advice designed to help companies and their stakeholders address socio-economic and environmental challenges and integrate corporate social responsibility (CSR) into mainstream business practice.

The paper presents a mathematical model of sustainable development which provides for the fundamental abstraction of the key concepts and parameters necessary for sustainable development to occur within the context of the Earth System – the coupled system of relationships and dynamics between the environment and humans. The model utilises basic mathematics to detail these concepts and parameters, as well as the conditions required for sustainable development to occur.

Promotion and protection of all human rights, civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights, including the right to development

In the article Gregory Unruh presents sustainability leadership as an evolutionary practice for most organizations, which consists of three phases: Learning, Alignment and Embedding.